altivo

And no, it wasn't spent at the computer either. Gary had two performances to be at today, so I did all the animal care stuff, and the grocery shopping. Ran into Woodstock at noon to have lunch with him and his fellow performers as I usually do after the farmer's market each month but everyone else was rushing off to somewhere else. Fortunately two friends had stopped by the market to hear the music and they joined us for lunch.

After bedding down the horses and sheep I went to water the garden and came back with three more zucchinis and a fist full of lettuces for dinner salad. Those were joined by a tomato from the planters in back of the library (which turned out to be sweet and very tasty.) I'm promised that I get the entire day tomorrow for weaving, which is a good thing as I need it.

Kept myself away from the computer by tying it up with large downloads. I switched from Slackware 10.2 to Wolvix Hunter this week, pretty much. I can still boot the older Slackware but I'm trying to avoid that. This means I need to recompile a few things I use regularly, such as the driver for the brain-dead winmodem in this machine, tinyfugue for mucking, and various emulation packages I use. Hmmm. The user install from the Wolvix CD didn't include development tools, like the C compiler or the assembler. OK, gotta add those. Wait, in order to compile that driver for the Intel 537EP modem I'll need the kernel source and headers. That's a major download over dialup, but it ran OK in about three hours. Not enough, though. Turns out I need several other large packages installed. Another 70 meg to download, so that will run, or try to run, overnight.

On the whole, I'm pleased with Wolvix or I wouldn't be doing this. It's Slackware 11, which is still one version back but that's OK. I prefer not to be on the cutting edge with Slackware. The kernel ix 2.6.x which is a nice upgrade from the 2.4.31 I've been running. It appears that some BOINC apps that crashed on the old kernel will run successfully with this one. That isn't supposed to happen, but it does. Slackware now has its own version of the Debian apt/aptitude/synaptic tool set that tracks and installs packages. It's called slapt or Gslapt and does work. They still need to build a better dependency table, but the tracking, selection, and installation of packages from online repositories is already just as slick as apt-get.

Current Mood: busy
Current Location: Home in the oak grove

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

thedeere.livejournal.com

I'm running Ubuntu 8.04, "Hairy Hardon" (Did I get that right? ;))... It's the first *nix I've gotten to successfully DO stuff, like go online etc. It's really nice!

I've been trying to switch to *nix since, hm, windows 95 happened. I tried Caldera and a couple others. But without knowing anyone who has it IRL to teach me stuff it was really a mess to get to work. 98 was wonderful for me for a long time, but it's beginning to get stale, and XP's just too gross EVEN for _ME_. Nevermind Windows Fistya.

Winmodems are a curse unto the earth. Even windows hates 'em, LOL! My internal proved to be a real modem though, Ubuntu likes it fine. Didn't even need the 56K external I bought. :)

Linux is a very different world for me. Like when I got a windows issue I can just ask somebody and they'll tell me. With Linux it's somewhat more challenging, I get answers like "LOL! NOOB!" and stuff in the linux IRC channels, but fortunately I made a couple friends that're awesome when I need a hand.

What's funny was the "decider" reason I went to Ubuntu: Firefox. Firefox was like a "Gateway Drug" in that I knew that, once I had Ubuntu going, there'd be one program I already knew how to use!

Yeah I love the AptGet kinda thing Ubuntu has! Glad yours has it too! Stuff like "Dependancies" make me itch. 'Course windows has 'em too, at least in the cases of directX and dotnet etc...

I'm enjoying linux so far, and I now have an upgrade path again. It's a GOOD feeling! I was thinking of taking up croquet or something if the alternative was Vista...

From:

altivo.livejournal.com

I recommend the Linux for Dummies book. It's very helpful for beginners. You do need to learn a bit to be proficient at Linux. It's like the difference between driving an automatic transmission and a stick, though. Most of it's the same, just a few small but important things to remember.

Also, when you have questions, there are two communities here on LJ where you can usually get some help without anyone pointing claws or hooves at you and snickering:

linuxfurs and

linuxhelp.

Winmodems are fine when they work. The one that came in my desktop machine worked fine with Slackware 10.2 once I found and compiled the appropriate driver. I'm sure it would work on Wolvix too (which is just Slackware 11 with some extras) except that the driver code hasn't been kept up to date. I could probably fix it, but it isn't worth days or weeks of effort to me. Most likely I'll press another machine on my network into service as the modem server. I've got one that will do, and the inboard modem, though it's only 32Kb/sec, is a real modem that looks like a serial port to Linux. Meanwhile I'm letting my mate's XP provide the connection for me.

From:

thedeere.livejournal.com

I've seen more strangeness with windmodems than probably any other piece of hardware except possibly scanners. Sometimes the web browser'll work but not the IRC, many odd things can happen because they're a virtual thing... Having said that though, yeah, sometimes you could mistake one for a real modem. :)

Thanks for those groups, just joined 'em! Yeah on IRC I've even been accused of being a "Flame Troll" for asking for advice on the linux. I swear those guys hate any windows user even to the point of trying to keep them from converting to linux. The attitude reminded me a bit of a tiny Daffy Duck standing inside the oyster hugging the pearl, going "MINE! MINE! ALL MINE!" hehehe

Next time I'm at Staples, I'll bag a copy of Linux for Dummies. I've looked at it before but never jumped, thanks for the recommend!

From:

altivo.livejournal.com

Glad to help if I can. I looked at Ubuntu early on and wasn't too impressed, so I can't offer much current information or help with things that are specific to the distribution. But Ubuntu has its own support forums, and the majority of Ubuntu users are probably new to Linux, so I'd suggest going there rather than to IRC. IRC is nasty about everything much of the time in my experience. It's certainly not a place I'd go for technical help.

From:

thedeere.livejournal.com

Well IRC's a sorta force of habit for me, so it's always my first pick. I'm used to taking a few heckles any time I join an unfamiliar channel there, I just wasn't expecting the sheer villainy I encountered in the linux forum, LOL!

I'm sure that as an experienced user you probably would find Ubuntu icky in the same way I find XP icky... But from the standpoint of someone who's gotten many black eyes from *nix over the years, Ubuntu's sorta amazing, almost worthy of it's own religion.

I s'pose the oddest thing about linux for me is how there are so many "flavors". With windows we got that too, like, 98 definatly qualifies as a "flavor" of windows, but those are more or less chronological where with linux, each flavor is kept more or less up-to-date. So a big question I have for linux users is "why isn't there one central version?"... It seems like that'd save ALOT of coding time, collectively.

Of course that very nature led to Ubuntu, which I'm happy with. I'm still waiting for this to happen though:

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/cautionary.png

I compile things once in a great while for windows so the concept's familiar but I just can't imagine doing it to the OS kernel, LOL! Maybe someday...

From:

altivo.livejournal.com

Different distributions in Linux happen for a number of reasons. Some, like RedHat, exist primarily because they provide a way for some corporation to make a profit. Even though they can't sell Linux itself, and are forced to give the basic OS away for free by the GNU licensing that underlies it, they create a peculiar flavor with their own additions and "enhancements" and then sell support, documentation, and in some cases non-open-source software for it.

Others exist just because someone thought they could see a "better way" to do it, which is where Ubuntu came from, and Wolvix, and several others.

The underlying differences are usually very small. It's the cosmetic differences, the look and feel, the installation process, and the way in which added software is installed to a working system or updates are applied, that makes the distributions different. Most of what you learn on one will apply to the others, provided it isn't strictly tied to graphical tools created just for that distribution.

Slackware is an old distribution and generally tried to make itself similar to BSD Unix in the beginning. It still has a strong BSD flavor to it, and requires command line or text editing of configuration files to get it up and running. The installer itself is still character based, and there's not a lot of focus on getting XWindows up and running during the install. Usually you have to configure that yourself once the command line is available.

Debian seems to focus on availability of a huge number of application tools and of course, the controlled management of package dependencies (though it can go badly awry, and I have seen that happen.)

Ubuntu (and its various flavors, like Kubuntu and Xubuntu) tries to cushion the user from the real workings of the OS by providing graphical tools for everything in the manner of Microsoft. I'm sure people who grew up relying on the GUI find that comforting, but I hate the way Microsoft now forces you to use a GUI tool for everything. I want to configure a firewall by looking at the actual permission and routing tables, which Microsoft makes almost impossible, for instance.

Firefox, BTW, runs just fine on virtually all Linux flavors, as long as the XWindows setup is correct. On the other hoof, there are a lot more web browsers available in Linux than there are in Windows. Epiphany, Konqueror, Galeon, Mozilla, even good ol' Netscape is still around.

From:

thedeere.livejournal.com

I don't mind a GUI operated OS. While I cut my teeth on DOS 3.3 (And DOOM, hehe), I never learned how to manage the case sensitivity of Linux's CLI. My brain just doesn't work that way, heh, and I fear they'll next come out with font sensitivity to give them even more command line switch combinations. >;)

That's why I stuck with DOS based windows though, I also like a CLI in order to work on the system when the graphical stuff kicks up it's little feet and dies. I'm sure that, armed with Linux for Dummies, I might have a better chance of being able to deal with that situation should it arise. I sincerely hope it never does however!

I've still got Netscape 4.5 on the 98 (along with firefox 2), I used Netscape right up until AOL demolished it with the dreaded "Shop" button. I wouldn't mind having a modern version of it again but Firefox seems to be "The Absolutely Ultimate" other than problems fetching files out of it's cache, which I feel is a serious limitation.

Thanks for the explanation of why so many linux flavors exist! That's always been a mystery to me. :)